Benkert, Franz Georg

Benkert, Franz Georg a Roman Catholic theologian of Germany, was born at Nordheim, September 25, 1790, studied at Wurzburg, and received holy orders in 1816. In 1823 he took the degree as doctor of theology by presenting his dissertation, De Duplici Missa Catechumenorum et Fidelium. In 1832 he was appointed regent of the clerical seminary, and in 1838 succeeded the famous Mohler as cathedral-dean of Wtirzburg? He died May 20, 1859. In 1822 he commenced the publication of the Religionsfreund, a periodical for systematic theology, literature, and contemporaneous history. For practical theology he founded Athanasia in 1827. In 1840 he resigned his connection with these two periodicals to devote himself entirely to the history of Franconia, and published as the result of his studies several interesting treatises in the Archiv des historischens Vereins von Unterfranken. See Stamminger, in Wetzer u. Welte's Kirchenlexikon, s.v. (B.P.)